


Somewhere Unfamiliar

by deathtouch



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Brothels, Rape Aftermath, Sex Work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-28
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2020-07-23 17:43:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20012287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathtouch/pseuds/deathtouch
Summary: ☛ written for themcgenji eventsmcgenji week 2019| day 7 - unfamiliar territoryChasing down a bad client, knocking them on their ass, kicking their ribs in, stealing back the money that had been earned over a long night of getting hurt... that was the easy part. Whether it was on your own behalf or someone else’s. The hard part was staying behind and picking up the pieces, cleaning up the mess. Looking at your own fucked up reflection in the mirror. Looking at the person you cared about, seeing them suffer.





	Somewhere Unfamiliar

Jesse swallowed hard, pushing down a wounded noise as he laid eyes on Genji. He didn’t have any right to feel wounded. Not right now. Not when Genji was lying there bruised and bleeding. 

He closed the door to Genji’s room behind him and hurried inside, rushing to the bed. The sage sheets were a rumpled mess, unscrupulous stains littered across the fabric. Genji was crumpled up into a small ball on top of the duvet, turned on his side, fetal and small.

“Hey, baby.”

Jesse got down low beside him, took in the measure of him, tried to assess the damage. He watched with worry as Genji’s chest rose and fell, slow labored breaths. Jesse could hear each gasp of air rattling around in his throat. He was all bruised there, dark marks smudged from his collarbone to right up under his chin.

Anger flashed through Jesse, hot and raw, but it quickly melted away. He had learned by now how useless it was to get mad. It wouldn’t help Genji any. Instead, he found the thread of concern hidden in his anger and plucked at it, pulling it to the surface. He ran his fingers as gently as he could through Genji’s green bangs, pushing back his hair.

There was a round lump welling up at his temple, not any particular color yet but it might end up being purple in the morning. His cheek was red from being slapped. Jesse hated that he recognized that for what it was. His lip was split too, cracked brown with dried blood and bright red with fresh.

“Can you hear me?” Jesse asked. “You with me?”

Genji’s brow furrowed like he was concerned. He nodded, just a little, and winced like it was a mistake.

That was a relief at least. Jesse had found him unconscious on more than one occasion before, and he wasn’t entirely looking to repeat those experiences.

“Can you speak?”

Genji swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing under his bruised skin. “Painful,” he whispered.

“Okay.” Jesse stroked his hair. “Okay, then. You don’t gotta talk. I’ll help you.”

Jesse had never really liked his job. It was okay when he first started; giving head here and there for a twenty. Then he was fucking and getting fucked in the back of cars for a couple hundred bucks. He never worked street corners or any cliche like that. It was just a thing that happened in parking lots or down at the banks of the river near the park the junkies loitered in. People would pull up, roll their window down, start making conversation with him, and the next he knew he was having sex and making money off of it.

Then he got mixed up in trying to make a career out of it. There were brothels and strip clubs and sex shops all up and down West Ninth street. They were always hiring. All he had to do was pick one, walk in and tell the person running the place that he was ready to work. He was smart enough not to try any of the high-end brothels near Ninth and Race. He knew he wasn’t their type.

He had it good for a while, but turnover was high. There was always someone better looking, or more enthusiastic, or willing to cede more of their earnings to the establishment’s owner, or less likely to talk back. Jesse bounced around from one joint to another, sometimes dragging regulars along with him, sometimes losing them in the process but always gaining new clients everywhere he went.

Then he ended up here; King’s Row. He didn’t know why they called it that. There was nothing majestic or royal about it. It was just a tall townhouse with a dozen or so rooms. He had his own that he worked out of. A handful of other guys worked out of their rooms, and there were always men coming and going. They all mostly got along with each other, or just minded their own business and didn’t much interact.

Jesse paid an allotment for rent and a ‘property manager’ came around to collect it once a month. Other than that, there was nearly no oversight. There were no set hours; he could come and go as he pleased. There was no one to hassle him about where he’d been or where he was going. No one to give him hell for his messy hair or unshaven face. But then again, there was no one there to break things up when clients got rough or sessions went bad. No one to bar problem customers from coming back again.

That was how Genji ended up in the predicament he was in more often than not.

Jesse hadn’t been keen on making friends. He wasn’t sure how long he’d be sticking around. He didn’t want to get mixed up in anyone else’s problems or money trouble. So he was nice enough to his neighbors, but not actively seeking their company or companionship. Then he met Genji, and Hanzo, and that ‘not having friends’ thing fell entirely by the wayside.

The two brothers were like thunder and lightning, and Jesse got on with them like a house on fire. He liked Hanzo a whole hell of a lot, but he loved Genji. He couldn’t help it. He knew better than to fall for someone in the business. Clients or coworkers. There was just something about Genji, though. Bright and amazing. Stunning and strong. Perfect in so many ways.

Jesse didn’t realize he‘d fallen for him until he had already face planted. Now it was too late to stop the hurt from coming. Hell, it already hurt. It hurt how much he cared about Genji. Jesse was willing to do just about anything for him. Including fend off dangerous clients, track down money he was owed, and pick up the pieces when a session went wrong like it had tonight.

Jesse had heard the noises from down the hall. The dull thudding of impact. Genji’s protests getting weaker, struggles fading. He was too understanding to intervene at first. He understood how hard it was to say no; how hard it was to turn down anyone. He understood how important it was to make that money, even if it was just a few more dollars.

None of them were planning to stay here forever; they couldn’t. No one would want them when they were old and tired. They had to get out of this place, this life, eventually. They would need money then. Hell, they needed money now. It wasn’t so easy just to stop working or to turn away paying customers.

He couldn’t just let Genji take a beating though. Not again. Hanzo had broken first, thundering in to break things up. He was off chasing the man who had done this to Genji now; he would probably tear him to shreds. Hanzo didn’t always seem dangerous. Just looking at the two of them, Genji had more of that excitable energy. He was more likely to go off. It was lying in wait in Hanzo though; the necessary precision and a willingness to protect what he cared about.

Chasing down a bad client, knocking them on their ass, kicking their ribs in, stealing back the money that had been earned over a long night of getting hurt... that was the easy part. Whether it was on your own behalf or someone else’s. The hard part was staying behind and picking up the pieces, cleaning up the mess. Looking at your own fucked up reflection in the mirror. Looking at the person you cared about, seeing them suffer.

Jesse was better at that than Hanzo was. So he was here for Genji when he needed to be; when it counted.

He took stock of everything one more time, going over it all in his head. Genji was breathing, he was aware, he could speak and move. There were a few obvious places where he’d been hurt, but there was still one place left Jesse knew he ought to check. His stomach twisted up in a terrible knot. He hated this part.

“Let me see if he hurt you,” He said, real gentle.

He slid a hand up the back of Genji’s thigh, easing his leg up. He used his fingers to spread Genji open, to take a look like he said he would. He felt sick when he saw the damage; everything was red and raw. There was blood. Not much, but any at all was bad.

Shit. “Baby, you’re bleeding. Let me call Baptiste.”

Genji cringed, curling tighter, drawing in on himself. “No.”

“I’ll pay for it.” Jesse didn’t care about the money. Hesitant as he was to spend his earnings on himself, he was always willing to pay for whatever Genji needed. If Genji would let him.

“No!” Genji said again, adamant this time, voice cracking painfully.

“Okay,” Jesse gave in. He immediately felt bad for pushing it. “I won’t call. Let me clean you up at least.”

Jean-Baptiste was good to them, always friendly, more understanding than most. He didn’t overcharge them, and he didn’t come around offering pity and charity either. It was nice to have his number, to know there was a doctor around they could trust.

Jesse understood why Genji didn’t want to see him, though. Not just because it cost money, but because no one wanted to be reminded of their mortality and there was nothing doctors did better than that. Genji had already been through hell this evening. He didn’t need another person to touch him, see him, or hurt him. Even if it was for his own good. He just didn’t need it.

“You wait right here, and I’ll draw you a bath. Alright?”

Genji nodded, relaxing a little so he wasn’t curled up quite so tight. Jesse hesitated to leave him, wanted to stay there with him on the bed stroking his hair a while longer. Genji wasn’t going to get any better like that, though, so after a long moment Jesse got up.

In the en-suite bathroom he frowned at the state of the tub, enamel cracking, grout dark. He plugged up the drain and twisted the handle for hot water. It loudly began to fill.

He went to the sink and pulled out the top drawer, digging through it until he found what he was looking for. A misleadingly innocent bottle of store-brand ibuprofen. The bottle didn’t have any over-the-counter pain killers in it, though. Instead, there was a discordant mix of morphine, oxy, and Vicodin that Jesse had gotten at the park by the river banks that the junkies hung out in.

He filled a cup in the sink and brought two Vicodin tablets to Genji where he was still curled up small on the sage green bed.

“Can you swallow these, baby?” Jesse asked him, kneeling down next to him.

Genji blinked his eyes open. He frowned at the drugs but that didn’t stop him from taking them. Jesse fed the cup to his lips, helped him drink. Genji made a horrible noise when he swallowed. The shock of the pain of it started him crying, tears welling up in his eyes. Then with the crying came gasping and breathing was already so painful for him that the gasping just made everything so much worse. He started sobbing in earnest, an awful muted sound.

“Hey, hey.” Jesse laid a warm hand on Genji’s chest. “Easy, Genji. It’s alright. Breathe slow. Don’t cry. It’ll stop hurting soon.”

He made his own breathing purposely slow, in and out, even and steady so that Genji could follow along. It took longer than it should, but the sobs eventually eased away.

Genji didn’t cry much. When he did there was something about it that made Jesse feel like an idiot. Like how come he wasn’t in touch with his own emotions? How come he couldn’t just cry like that, get it all out, and still be strong? It was part of why he admired Genji so much. He didn’t have weak moments. Not even now, when he was hurt and crying. There was nothing but bravery and strength in the way he was fighting through the pain.

“Can I pick you up?” Jesse asked, brushing away some tears from Genji’s cheek.

Genji nodded. He extended his arms, wrapping them around Jesse’s neck, clinging easily. Jesse lifted him out of bed. He was a grown man so he was plenty heavy, but Jesse wasn’t so old yet that he couldn’t lift him up and carry him the few steps to the bathroom.

The tub was good and filled, hot even despite how quickly the hot water ran out in this building. Jesse carefully eased Genji in. He winced at first but relaxed into it. It was a little too small to stretch out fully, but the warmth would do him some good.

Jesse sat down on the tile floor beside him. Stuck his elbow on the edge of the tub and admired Genji’s pretty face. Even bruised and injured, he was still pretty. Jesse could see past the hurt to the person underneath. Always could.

Then the drugs started kicking in, and Genji _actually_ relaxed. The tension melted away from him, the pinch between his eyebrows disappeared, his muscles all went soft, and he sunk deeper into the bath with a sigh. Jesse had to get up and hunt for a clean washcloth and some soap.

“Just gonna clean you up. You stay good and still, ya hear?”

Genji nodded gently. His hands had floated up to the surface of the bath, knuckles bobbing up out of the water.

Jesse wet the cloth and used a corner of it to dab at Genji’s lip. He wiped away the tear marks on his face. He got out the soap and started smoothing it all over Genji’s skin. He scrubbed away the sticky, still-drying come from Genji’s chest. He was impossibly gentle going over any bruise. He soaped up the tattoo on his ribs that curled down towards his hip, then Genji’s legs and his soft thighs,

“Can you spread your legs for me, baby?” Jesse asked, heart hurting a little. “I’ll be gentle.”

Genji spread his legs, closing his eyes. Jesse’s hand disappeared deep under the water. It was cloudy white from all the soap he’d been using. He couldn’t see but he could feel. He was gentle as he said he would be, working his fingers where Genji was used and hurt. There was no lube to clean away, so he cleaned up the blood instead.

His fingers stroked over something and Genji’s whole body flinched, eyes flying open. He reached down to clamp his own hand around Jesse’s wrist, stilling him from going any further. “Ow,” he breathed. He was still tender there, obviously.

“Sorry,” Jesse apologized readily. “Sorry, baby. It’s done, though. You’re all done.” He carefully extracted his hand from Genji’s death grip and pulled it from the water. “Is that a little better?”

“I think so,” Genji whispered. His voice was gone but with the Vicodin thrumming through him he could manage quiet replies.

“You just relax there til the water cools off. Then I’ll get you dry and take you back to my room.” The sheets would be clean there at least.

Genji nodded, agreeing. He closed his eyes again. Jesse wished the tub was bigger so he could really stretch out. A nice big bathtub with some of those fancy jets that made the water bubble. That’s what he needed. No. Deserved.

Jesse couldn’t help but reach out and stroke through Genji’s green hair again. He gently pushed his bangs back over and over, stroking his scalp. Genji deserved so many things finer than this, the sad situation they were in. A nice house, a nice car. A nice life where he didn’t get hit or hurt anymore. Ever. Safety, security, happiness.

Jesse wanted so badly to give that to him.

“We should get out of here,” he said quietly, a soft murmur.

Genji opened his eyes to look at him.

“You and me. We hit the road and never look back. What do you say?”

The questions brought a smile to Genji’s face. They had had this conversation before, a dozen times. Smoking out front of the building in the summer, heat and humidity ruining their night. Sitting on the fire escape in February when it was way too fucking cold to be outside. Over take out dinner. Curled up in bed together.

_Let’s run away. Let’s leave. You and me. Let’s pack our things and go._

“Where will we go?” Genji asked, whispering still.

Jesse thought about it a moment. “You can take me to that place in Japan. The town with the little arcade.”

Genji’s smile got all genuine at the memory but then turned wistful and sad. “I can’t go back to Japan.”

Jesse knew that. He didn’t know why he couldn’t go back, but he had heard Genji and Hanzo both say that they could never go home again. Jesse didn’t ask. He knew what it was like. He couldn’t exactly go home either. That didn’t stop him from bringing it up next, though.

“Okay. We’ll go west. Get ourselves a ragtop and drive Route 66. We can stop anywhere on the interstate you want. If we find a nice town in Arizona or New Mexico we can stay there. Settle down.” 

Genji’s hand found his. This time not grabbing desperately at his wrist. No, he laced his fingers with Jesse’s and squeezed. “You can’t go back there.”

Yeah. Jesse knew that. His stomach got queasy when he considered the reality of it, and how bad that would be. He would be putting himself in a dangerous situation sure, but worst of all he would be putting Genji in harm’s way and he didn’t want that. No, not at all.

“Okay, we’ll go north then.” Jesse decided. “To Canada.” He’d never suggested Canada before, but it seemed like a good idea. “All the way up, where it’s cold all year long and light out for days at a time, and no neighbors around for miles and miles.”

Genji seemed like he wanted to laugh, but he knew it would hurt too much. “What would we do in Canada?”

“We’ll move into a log cabin. I could be a lumberjack.”

Genji did laugh at that, but then immediately flinched in pain and abruptly stopped laughing.

“I’ll bring us firewood to keep the cabin warm. We’ll have lots of tartan blankets, and always enough hot chocolate and whiskey.” Jesse stroked his thumb over the back of Genji’s hand. “Maybe some dogs, you know. Huskies with thick coats; sled dogs. We’ll write each other secret messages in the frost on the window panes. I’ll drive you into town in my truck with its snow chains whenever you want. We’ll be regulars at the diner there. Drink coffee and eat pie and everyone will know us by name without asking or caring where we came from.”

Genji was staring at him with this impossibly fond expression on his face. He was imagining it, seeing it too. Seeing how it could all be real. If they packed up now, they could make it by tomorrow. If they gathered all their earnings, they would have enough for the next few months, maybe half a year if they stretched it.

They didn’t even have to go north to Canada. Not if they didn’t want to. They could go anywhere. Anywhere at all in the world. Somewhere unfamiliar. Somewhere safe.

“...I can’t leave Hanzo,” Genji whispered.

That was how this conversation always ended, or course. No matter which perfect place they dreamt up, near or far, they would never be able to go because Genji couldn’t leave Hanzo behind.

Never mind the fact that Hanzo didn’t need them. He had it the best out of all three of them. His regulars loved him, doted on him. Hell, the only reason he hadn’t been whisked off to live with Jack and Gabriel in their house with them was probably that he ‘couldn’t leave Genji.’

“I know.” Jesse smiled, understanding. He loved Genji to bits and knew full well getting between him and his brother was the fastest way to disaster.

It wouldn’t be like this forever, though. It couldn’t be. Something would have to give eventually. Jesse had faith that they would make their great escape one of these days, with or without Hanzo. It would take them a little longer to get there, but they would get there.

That unfamiliar place would just have to wait.

**Author's Note:**

> send requests or prompts ➝ [here](https://curiouscat.me/deathtouch)  
> follow me on twitter ➝ [here](https://twitter.com/deathtouchxx)  
> thanks for reading ✩°｡⋆


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